This Volume Encompasses In Its Fold Different Aspects Of Buddhism And Their Propounders And Great Acharyas Of Nalanda, Highlighting The Contributions Of Nalanda Mahavira, The Old And The New.

The aim of the article is to define the tendencies of elaboration of ethical problems in early medieval exegetical texts - treatises of post-canonical Abhidharma. Ethics as a specific philosophical discipline concerning morals was not specifically developed because of cosmological character of Buddhist philosophy. Explication of the ethical discourse presented in treatises of eminent early medieval Indian Buddhist exegetics Vasubandhu, Asaṅga and Yaśomitra showed that specific for ethics questions on the highest good, sense of human life, the nature (...) and sources of morals, freedom of will etc. were solved in post-canonical period. According to the religious doctrine they interpreted the highest good as the benefit of liberation from the fetches of suffering. The Buddha’s moral instructions known as prātimokṣa is aimed at the attainment of the highest good. Therefore the essence of morality has nothing to do with saṃsāra, and human society forming and perishing in cosmic cycles cannot be the source of moral norms. According to historiosophical myth, human beings get the first instructions on righteous behavior in deep antiquity from charismatic Universal ruler coming to the world as the forerunner of the Buddha. He explains ontological contrariness of the good and the evil but is not the Teacher of the truth. Freedom of will cannot manifest itself spontaneously in a human being attached affectively to saṃsāra. Such an individual falsely takes his ignorant self-will for the freedom of will. Hearing the sermons of salvific teaching is the condition for the rising of free will impulse. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Scriptural AuthorityA Buddhist PerspectiveShi ZhiruLike gold that is melted, cut, and polished, So should monks and scholars Analyze my words [before] accepting them; They should not do so out of respect.1As other papers in this volume have already noted, there is a crisis of authority in modern religion, particularly in the West. One defining characteristic of modernity is a deep sense of rupture from the old, from the (...) traditional, which is compounded by a heightened awareness of the subjectivity of self.2 Therefore, in the age of modernity, or postmodernity, critical and skeptical questioning of forms of religious authority is almost inevitable. While the crisis of religious authority is certainly enhanced in modernity, I would argue that the crisis of authority has always been part and parcel of religious innovation and transmission in Buddhist history. Critical self-reflection and skepticism of scriptural authority were present already in early Buddhism; at various junctures throughout Buddhist history, attitudes toward scriptural authority were often renegotiated in connection with major religious changes that in turn were usually prompted by larger social and historical changes. As the critical theorist Jürgen Habermas points out, “the term ‘modern’ again and again expresses the consciousness of an epoch that relates itself to the past of antiquity, in order to view itself as the result of a transition from the old to the new.” 3 Defined in this manner, the bridging of the “modern” and the past is not unique to the so-called epoch of modernity or postmodernity, but has occurred repeatedly throughout different historical periods.This paper discusses different junctures in Buddhist history when scriptural authority was problematized as part of self-reflection and criticism of the “tradition.” Rethinking the authority of scriptures often involves juxtaposing it against the authority of religious experience, and such reconsideration typically took place as part of religious change that unfolded in different sociocultural and geographical environments. It is tempting to immediately equate “religious experience” in the early Buddhist texts to the prevalent understanding of this term in the modern world, but one must caution that modern definitions and discourse on the topic are largely shaped [End Page 85] by post-Enlightenment ideals and rhetoric in Western religious history, which may not be applicable to traditional Buddhist cultures.4 Hence, it is necessary to unpack the range of premodern Buddhist understanding of “religious experience” according to its contextual references, and not hasten to assume a necessary polarity between the unmediated experience and scriptural exegesis that is generally assumed in modern discourse. Rather than a singular voice for the Buddhist position on scriptural authority, it is important to acknowledge the polyphony of voices and perspectives, sometimes even contradicting one another, in different forms of Buddhism. It is thus critical to contextualize the multiple voices within the different historical and religious circumstances that engendered a particular perspective.It should be noted that my discussion is hardly intended to be a comprehensive survey, but focuses on three examples: early Buddhism, early Mahāyāna, and Chan Buddhism. They are chosen because they aptly illustrate how Buddhists reconceived scriptural or textual authority as part of a critical rethinking of Buddhist thought and practice. Moreover, while religious experience was regularly invoked to undermine the normative scriptural authority of the time, nevertheless, in all the examples considered in this paper, the undermining of “old” scriptural authority gave way to new scriptural or literary authorities. This prioritization of religious experience in reality rarely excludes scriptural or textual authorities, but was often adopted for polemical and rhetorical purposes. The paper concludes with an attempt to broaden the understanding of Buddhist scriptural authority by highlighting the authority of scriptures as material objects, a perspective that has been largely neglected in comparative cross-cultural studies of scriptures.5 On a cautionary note, I am using the word “scripture” in a broad sense to mean the body of sacred texts accepted as the authority by a given religious tradition. As historians of religion have noted, it is necessary to dissociate sacred texts (particularly those of Asian religions) from the concept of “scripture,” which in its literal sense, as used to discuss Abrahamic religions, means the “written word... (shrink)

There is a quiet revolution afoot in our understanding of Early Buddhism, Pyrrhonism, and the Greek, Indian, and Central Asian cultural worlds of Hellenistic antiquity. The implications for the history of philosophy and religion are potentially profound.Christopher Beckwith's recent remarkable and provocative book, Greek Buddha: Pyrrho's Encounter with Early Buddhism, is the latest work breaking important new ground in this area.1 It offers no less than a wholesale geographical and chronological restructuring of traditional Buddhism, upsetting decades of scholarship. Along the (...) way, Beckwith advances the following audacious claims:That the Buddha was a Scythian, not an Indian.That he lived much later than commonly... (shrink)

This first volume of "The History of Evil" covers Graeco-Roman, Indian, Near Eastern and Eastern philosophy and religion from 2000 BCE to 450 CE. The volume charts the foundations of the history of evil among the major philosophical traditions and world religions, beginning with the oldest recorded traditions: the Vedas and Upanishads, Confucianism and Daoism, and Buddhism. This cutting-edge treatment of the history of evil at its crucial and determinative inception will appeal to those with particular interests in the ancient (...) period as well as those seeking an understanding of how later philosophical and religious developments were conditioned and shaped. (shrink)

In his article Banicki proposes a universal model for all forms of philosophical therapy. He is guided by works of Martha Nussbaum, who in turn makes recourse to Aristotle. As compared to Nussbaum’s approach, Banicki’s model is more medical and less based on ethical argument. He mentions Foucault’s vision to apply the same theoretical analysis for the ailments of the body and the soul and to use the same kind of approach in treating and curing them. In his interpretation of (...) philosophical therapy, there are, however, some controversial issues, to which we would like to call attention: -/- Is restoring health by a philosophical method of treatment – health understood as a person’s ability to reach his/her vital goals – a convincing explication of philosophical therapy in general? In order to answer this question, it may be useful to look at Plato. It is not only Platonism (and especially Neo-platonism since Plotinus) that questions the idea that therapy is necessarily connected with „vital goals“. Buddhist and Gnostic philosophies are questioning „the vital“ in general. The immense effort in the history of philosophy to liberate the mind from the body casts doubt on the project to explain philosophical therapy solely in analogy to medical therapy. -/- According to Banicki a therapeutic philosophy has to identify the diseases it attempts at curing. There are, however, reasons for associating the term therapy with suffering/risk rather than disease. If a therapy aims at reducing the fear of death, as for example many classical philosophical therapies do, then there is no disease to be cured. A model based on chances and risks also has the advantage that the Buddhist and Stoic reinterpretation of desires/emotions as “diseases” can be dropped in contemporary philosophical therapy. -/- Banicki mentions the comparison of therapies as one of the primary goals of modelling. Methods should be verified by a statistical correlation between method and therapeutic success and/or by a theory which justifies the method. Some forms of therapies, however, avoid theory-specific terms and concepts in favor of an unprejudiced interpretation of the patient’s statements. Others share the (Nietzschean) aspiration to explore and change measures of value. If the therapeutic process is seen as a unique phenomenon, then there can be no theory and no statistics with co-occurrences. -/- According to Banicki philosophical therapy has to describe techniques which qualify as genuinely philosophical. Techniques like maieutics and hermeneutics, however, are antique philosophical “inventions”, which were later adopted by psychotherapy. If meditation is accepted as a therapeutic tool – as it was in ancient times – then there is not only a methodical but also an emotional relation to religion. If finally, the Socratic search for a good life is seen as one of the characteristics of philosophical therapy, then delimitation even turns into a criterion for non-philosophical therapies. The search for a good life requires an interdisciplinary approach. -/- For the concretization of the formal structure, we suggest a typology of therapies, which is based on chances and risks. Such a typology has the advantage, that it can model conflicting (and even opposing) forms of therapies. The variety of therapeutic goals and methods is a consequence of the historical development towards conceptual freedom. (shrink)

The atom bomb that annihilated Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945, proved Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity. Mass became energy and the classic Western dialectic of three-dimensional space and linear time was displaced by the integrated concept of spacetime. On that day, modern physics also collided with the traditional Japanese understanding that space and time are interdependent phenomena. This collision speaks to conceptual parallels relating Buddhist thought, modern Japanese philosophy, phenomenology, and the physics of spacetime. The thirteenth-century Zen (...) class='Hi'>Buddhist monk Dōgen said that all phenomena are made possible by the universal principle of emptiness and that our existence arises with each moment in what he termed Being-Time, where past, present, and future co-exist. The Japanese philosopher Nishida Kitarō, along with Tanabe Hajime and Watsuji Tetsurō, saw reality as a multi-dimensional field of space-in-time where the individual subject no longer stood apart from the objective world but instead arose dynamically as contingent activities rather than an autonomous thing. The German philosopher Martin Heidegger rejected the rational binary of subject and object in Western thought and grounded our “being” in phenomena that came from their temporal being-in-the-world rather than representing some preexisting objective reality. The physicist Albert Einstein radically rethought the dialectic of three-dimensional space and linear time, used to schematize the physical world in the West since antiquity, and theorized the relativity of spacetime, in which all phenomena occur in space in relation to their place in time. Interwoven, these intellectual threads stripped the bombing of Hiroshima of its historical inevitability. The story of human experience lost its customary sense of going somewhere predetermined and was revealed instead to be an endlessly discrete accumulation of moments that could go anywhere at every transient and directionless moment in time. (shrink)

Though the term “comparative philosophy” often brings to mind the relatively recent “East-West” encounter, the experience of cultural difference has helped to invigorate philosophical inquiry throughout human history. Doug Berger’s Encounters of Mind highlights this. Over the course of six chapters, Berger follows “the trek of [Vijñānavāda] Buddhism from South to East Asian worlds,” tracing the development of the idea of luminous mind and its centrality to the question of personhood in Chinese Buddhism and Neo-Confucianism. Rather than simply rehash antiquated (...) debates, he reveals nuances of a thriving dialogue that is pertinent to contemporary discussions of personal identity. (shrink)

The meaning of the term logagogy is elucidated, and logagogic practices are outlined in the history of medicine. It is shown how the traditional medicine of India, Ayurveda, shows signs of logagogic practices(sattvavajaya), and that not only Ayurveda but also the famous Greek physician Galenus emphasize a philosophical approach to medicine. As Galenus’s logagogic practices have their roots in the tradition of practical philosophy in Greek antiquity, the most important Greek schools of thought that are relevant to logagogic approaches are (...) sketched. It is shown that the Stoics created a rationalistic system emphasizing the importance of the logos for human beings, and that Epicurus made advances in psychoeducation and cognitive reframing that are important for logagogic practices. These logagogic approaches of antiquity have been taken up by modern counseling in philosophical practices. The article closes with an outline of a clinical logagogy. (shrink)

The two-volume Cambridge History of Atheism offers an authoritative and up to date account of a subject of contemporary interest. Comprised of sixty essays by an international team of scholars, this History is comprehensive in scope. The essays are written from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including religious studies, philosophy, sociology, and classics. Offering a global overview of the subject, from antiquity to the present, the volumes examine the phenomenon of unbelief in the context of Christian, Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu, (...) and Jewish societies. They explore atheism and the early modern Scientific Revolution, as well as the development of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and its continuing implications. The History also includes general survey essays on the impact of scepticism, agnosticism and atheism, as well as contemporary assessments of thinking. Providing essential information on the nature and history of atheism, The Cambridge History of Atheism will be indispensable for both scholarship and teaching, at all levels. (shrink)

This book presents the views of 22 women philosophers from outside the Greco-Roman and Judeo-Christian worlds. These eminent thinkers are from Mesopotamia, India, Tibet, China, Korea, Japan, Australia, America, the Philippines and Nigeria. Six philosophers, the earliest of whom predates the Greek pre-Socratics by two thousand years, lived at “the dawn of philosophy”; another six from late Antiquity through the Classical period; five more taught and wrote during the Middle Ages up to the Age of Exploration, and yet five others (...) were active during the modern period to the mid-twentieth century. Most belonged to major philosophical traditions: Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, Zen, or Sufism. The chapters of the book describe the life and views of the philosophers, outline the fundamental features of their respective schools, and contain translations of their writings. The book is intended for scholars of philosophy and women’s studies who wish to expand their knowledge of non-Western philosophical traditions and is ideally suited for undergraduate education. Comprehensive multilingual bibliographies of carefully documented sources offer scholars many promising resources for further research. (shrink)

Scholars of religion have always been fascinated by asceticism. Some have even regarded this radical way of life-- the withdrawal from the world, combined with practices that seriously affect basic bodily needs, up to extreme forms of self-mortification --as the ultimate form of a true religious quest. This view is rooted in hagiographic descriptions of prominent ascetics and in other literary accounts that praise the ascetic life-style. Scholars have often overlooked, however, that in the history of religions ascetic beliefs and (...) practices have also been strongly criticized, by followers of the same religious tradition as well as by outsiders. The respective sources provide sufficient evidence of such critical strands but surprisingly as yet no attempt has been made to analyze this criticism of asceticism systematically. This book is a first attempt of filling this gap. Ten studies present cases from both Asian and European traditions: classical and medieval Hinduism, early and contemporary Buddhism in South and East Asia, European antiquity, early and medieval Christianity, and 19th/20th century Aryan religion. Focusing on the critics of asceticism, their motives, their arguments, and the targets of their critique, these studies provide a broad range of issues for comparison. They suggest that the critique of asceticism is based on a worldview differing from and competing with the ascetic worldview, often in one and the same historical context. The book demonstrates that examining the critics of asceticism helps understand better the complexity of religious traditions and their cultural contexts. The comparative analysis, moreover, shows that the criticism of asceticism reflects a religious worldview as significant and widespread in the history of religions as asceticism itself is. (shrink)

My subject is the history of science in antiquity, where the convention I adopt for “antiquity” is that it covers everything from the earliest recorded Mesopotamian investigations in the third millennium BCE down to the end of the third century CE, by which time two particularly significant upheavals had taken place at either end of the Euro-Asia land mass. I refer to the Christianization of the Greco-Roman World and the rise of Buddhism in China. That study poses a number of (...) distinctive problems, both substantive and methodological, which I shall go on immediately to identify. At the same time it is particularly worthwhile, in my view, for the light it can throw on very early efforts at understanding the physical world. Let me give a brief preliminary explanation of my main thesis. (shrink)

The author argues that an analysis ofthe texts ofthe Collection of Hippocrates leads to the conclusion that long before the methodological genius of Aristotle there existed a highly analytical culture among medical professionals. The differences in understanding of the value and objectives of a valid inference in Hippocrates and Aristotle are explained in terms of the characteristics of the discourse that each of them used. Aristotle is argued to have been using a social-dialectical discourse, whereas, in medical practice, a combination (...) of skills and reasoning had the highest value because what was expected from a doctor was the right diagnosis and the right treatment. The author argues that rational medical tradition of antiquity did not reach the logical reflection. According to her, the doctrine of the necessary connection between the logical attribute and the object of inferences had been developed in the Buddhist logic, which, as the author argues, can be considered a rational component of education in Tibetan medicine. (shrink)

Traditional Chinese philosophy, if engaged at all, is often regarded as an object of antiquated curiosity and dismissed as unimportant in the current age of globalization. Written by a team of internationally renowned scholars, this book, however, challenges this judgement and offers an in-depth study of pre-modern Chinese philosophy from an interdisciplinary perspective. Exploring the relevance of traditional Chinese philosophy for the global age, it takes a comparative approach, analysing ancient Chinese philosophy in its relation to Western ideas and contemporary (...) postmodernist theories. The conversation extends over a broad spectrum of philosophical areas and themes, ranging from metaphysics, hermeneutics, political theory, religion and aesthetics to specific philosophical schools including Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism. By engaging many time-honoured philosophical issues from a comparative perspective, this book bridges the gap between Eastern and Western thought and emphasises the need for a newly fortified global humanism and a deeper appreciation of different philosophical and religious values in an age gripped by large-scale crises. Arguing that traditional Chinese philosophy has immediate relevance to the many challenges of modern life, this book will be useful to students and scholars of Asian Philosophy and Asian Studies in general. (shrink)

Three parts of philosophical papers concerned with works, matters and traditions, respectively, present ways of dealing methodically with problems that arise while having and articulating experience. The contents range from philosophy in Antiquity as well as Buddhist to existentialism and analytic philosophy, from relating science and art to the antagonism between freedom and justice. By reflecting on the particular steps of argument the papers become samples of dialogical philosophy with respect both to subject matter and means of procedure.

Reflected in the more than three thousand entries in this reference work is the rigorous professional training and the maturity of a lifetime of learning by an eminent scholar. Through judicious selection, Professor MacGregor has produced an essential and highly accessible reference book While no dictionary can pretend to cover every conceivable aspect within its field, the scope of this one makes it a unique desk companion for students at every level of religious studies. In addition to its extensive presentation (...) of religious and philosophical ideas of the Judeo-Christian heritage, the Dictionary of Religion and Philosophy also treats vast numbers of concepts that span philosophical and religious ideas from Egyptian and Indian antiquity to the Bogomils and the Druze, from the Zoroastrians to contemporary movements as diverse as scientology and the Rastafarians, from Neoplatonism to the Vienna circle, from the varieties of Buddhism to the schisms in Islam, from bioethical questions in ancient India to contemporary American discussions on euthanasia. All told, this is the most expansive one-volume desk reference work available for religious studies. Extensive bibliographies, organized by subject at the end of the book further its value as a reference work. (shrink)

The two-volume Cambridge History of Atheism offers an authoritative and up to date account of a subject of contemporary interest. Comprised of sixty essays by an international team of scholars, this History is comprehensive in scope. The essays are written from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including religious studies, philosophy, sociology, and classics. Offering a global overview of the subject, from antiquity to the present, the volumes examine the phenomenon of unbelief in the context of Christian, Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu, (...) and Jewish societies. They explore atheism and the early modern Scientific Revolution, as well as the development of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and its continuing implications. The History also includes general survey essays on the impact of scepticism, agnosticism and atheism, as well as contemporary assessments of thinking. Providing essential information on the nature and history of atheism, The Cambridge History of Atheism will be indispensable for both scholarship and teaching, at all levels. (shrink)

In spite of the fact that ideas in line with the world-outlook format of realism (as also those in the format of irrealism) come back already to Antiquity, it was not earlier than from the end of the 18th century that the metaphilosophical concept under discussion has begun to evolve. The initial becoming of the concept of philosophical realism during score of years from the first edition of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason (1781) to Schelling’s System of Transcendental Idealism (1801) (...) is just being dealt with in this paper. The term came about eighty years later than “idealism” (introduced in 1702 by Leibnitz), and Kant inaugurated it most likely to distance his system from that of Berke­ley to whom he was indebted, it seems, still more than to Hume (their congeniality is spe­cified in the article in the mirror of intercultural philosophy, i.e. in both systems, just as in the Buddhist vijňānavāda, our persuasion that we can perceive outer things as existing independently from our mind was regarded as the radical illusion of mind). The author stands up for Friedrich Jacobi by offering specification of the advantages of “the robust realism” over “feigned” Kantian realism. Meanwhile, he suggests also the distinction be­tween the transcendental idealistic doctrine of Kant and realistic potency of his philosophy, which, in his opinion, becomes more intelligible after Hilary Putnam’s theory of realism. In this context the Kantian term “transcendental realism” itself could acquire not negative but mostly affirmative connotations. The author also suggests actualization of Kant’s “re­alistic capacity” for today’s ontology by highlighting his implicit differentiation of the layers of reality. In contrast, Fichtean and Schellingean dialectical sports with cor­relations of idealism and realism could be of interest, in the author’s view, only to histori­ans of philosophy. (shrink)

For centuries, westerners have referred to China's numerous traditions of spiritual expression as "religious"--a word born of western thought that cannot completely characterize the passionate writing that fills the pages of this pathbreaking anthology. The first of its kind in well over thirty years, this text offers the student of Chinese ritual and cosmology the broadest range of primary sources from antiquity to the modern era. Readings are arranged chronologically and cover such concepts as Taoism, Confucianism, Buddhism, and even communism. (...) A large number of the selections concern the role of the female in Chinese religion, and are either by or about women. Through invocations, poetry, drama, philosophical texts, religious treatises, and modern fiction, students hear the voices of numerous Chinese masters expounding on the movements and traditions that inspired them: the mysterious Tao-te ching of Lao Tzu, cloaked in the mists of deepest antiquity; the Analects of stately, reverent Confucius; "Nailing a Stick into Empty Space," from The Recorded Conversations of Ch'an Master I-hsuan, and many others, including the work of Mencius, Pan Chao, Han Shan, Chang Tsai, Wang Yang-ming, Lu Hsun, and Mao Tse-tung. Fully one third of the translations are new, and each reading is preceded by an introduction that explains its importance and salient features. Complete with a helpful chronology of dynasties and list of possible video sources, this remarkable volume collects under one cover the most significant and influential works of China's dynamic spiritual tradition, making a fundamental contribution to courses in Chinese religion, literature, and history. (shrink)

The author argues that an analysis ofthe texts ofthe Collection of Hippocrates leads to the conclusion that long before the methodological genius of Aristotle there existed a highly analytical culture among medical professionals. The differences in understanding of the value and objectives of a valid inference in Hippocrates and Aristotle are explained in terms of the characteristics of the discourse that each of them used. Aristotle is argued to have been using a social-dialectical discourse, whereas, in medical practice, a combination (...) of skills and reasoning had the highest value because what was expected from a doctor was the right diagnosis and the right treatment. The author argues that rational medical tradition of antiquity did not reach the logical reflection. According to her, the doctrine of the necessary connection between the logical attribute and the object of inferences had been developed in the Buddhist logic, which, as the author argues, can be considered a rational component of education in Tibetan medicine. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Explaining Away the Greek Gods in IslamJohn WalbridgeOf the angels newly fallen from heaven, Milton tells us:Nor had they yet among the Sons of Eve Got them new Names...Men took... Devils to adore for Deities: Then were they known to men by various Names, And various Idols through the Heathen World.Among the devils worshipped as gods among the ancients were the Olympians:Th’ Ionian Gods, of Javans Issue held Gods, (...) yet confest later then Heav’n and Earth Thir boasted parents; Titan Heavn’s first born With his enormous brood, and birthright seis’d By younger Saturn, he from mightier Jove His own and Rhea’s Son like measure found; So Jove usurping reign’d: these first in Creet And Ida known, thence on the Snowy top Of cold Olympus rul’d the middle Air Thir highest Heav’n; or on the Delphian Cliff, Or in Dodona, and through all the bounds Of Doric Land....Paradise Lost, I: 364–65, 372–75, 508–19 [End Page 389]Milton’s assertion that the Greek gods were demons goes back to the centuries in which those ancient gods slowly yielded to the new and jealous triune God of the Christians. Augustine in The City of God does not deny the reality of the old gods but identifies them as dead heroes or as demons. The power of the old gods was still manifest to the Christians of antiquity; it was their moral worth, not their existence, that was to be challenged.Such an interpretation is not found in Muslim accounts of the Greek gods. For all practical purposes Greek polytheism was entirely dead by the time Islam came onto the scene. Indeed, even Arabian polytheism, though still vigorous when Muhammad began his prophetic career, died out within three decades of the proclamation of Islam. Pious Muslims might be offended by the icons in Christian churches, but the temples of the Greek gods were gone these three centuries or more, their statues broken up and their stones stolen to build churches. The other forms of polytheism with which Islam came into contact—Zoroastrianism (the most important), Buddhism, Hinduism, and gnostic religions like Manichaeism and Harranian Sabianism—could rightly be understood as forms of monotheism (or dualism). Only the occasional idol temple in some out-of-the-way place—the shrine of the god Zun or Zur in Zamindawar in Afghanistan, 1 for example—might illustrate pure idol worship, but such institutions were soon destroyed and posed little intellectual challenge. Thus, by the time highly intellectual forms of Islam came into being in the eighth and ninth centuries, there was no real idol-worshipping paganism to oppose. Despite the uncompromising monotheism of Islam, polytheism aroused little emotion for the generations of Muslims born after the passing of the Prophet’s companions. Shirk, polytheism, went on to have a rich history in Islamic thought, but it was idols of the soul, not idols carved from stone and wood, that stirred the imaginations and fears of serious Muslims.The Muslim contact with Greek polytheism was thus not with living pagans but with literary allusions in Greek philosophical and scientific texts. In late antiquity philosophy had been the last bastion of paganism, a fortress whose outworks may have been stormed perhaps but whose citadel still held out, manned by doughty and commited fighters like Proclus and Simplicius. But the fortress had at last fallen, and even the ancient philosophers had finally been brought to the baptismal font.The fact that they knew little more than the names of Greek gods was another factor preventing Muslim scholars from taking alarm at Greek polytheism. The obvious first question to ask when we examine what Muslims thought of the Greek gods is what they might have known about them. How indeed do we know about Greek religion? Mostly we know mythology from literature: Hesiod, Homer, Greek drama, and manuals of literature and rhetoric. None of [End Page 390] these sources were available to Muslims. The translators were not interested in literature, which they knew resisted translation, so even Homer appears in Arabic sources as a sage, one of a number of authors of wise sayings... (shrink)

What was the fate of personalistic vitalism in later Indian thought? That question is too large to be considered here, but it is certain that the doctrine did reemerge, and has remained influential. Nonetheless, there is some reason to believe that Śātarak $$\underset{\raise0.3em\hbox{$\smash{\scriptscriptstyle\cdot}$}}{s}$$ ita critique of personalistic vitalism did have an immediate impact on philosophers within the Nyāya tradition: Vācaspatimiśra, Uddyotakara's sub-commentator, whom we know to have been familiar with Śātarak $$\underset{\raise0.3em\hbox{$\smash{\scriptscriptstyle\cdot}$}}{s}$$ ita Tattvasa $$\underset{\raise0.3em\hbox{$\smash{\scriptscriptstyle\cdot}$}}{m}$$ graha simply passes over Uddyotakara's already (...) equivocal argument without making any effort to defend it. Certainly, he had concluded that Uddyotakara's weak assertion of personalistic vitalism was either not important, or else a lost cause. Is it too much to suppose that he might have let himself be convinced, in this case, by a Buddhist?The ancient debate between ātmavādin and anātmavādin was at the heart of a conflict between opposing systems of salvation. To construe this, however, in accordance with our contemporary categorical schemes involves a fundamental error, for “systems of salvation” in ancient India were concerned with human nature and the human world, in a rich and full sense. What I have tried to indicate here is that one strand of the debate in question can be isolated and shown to involve progressive developments in the conceptual analysis of a basic biological doctrine. Other strands that might similarly be analyzed bear upon the theories of agency and causation, and rational and empirical psychology. To study these and many other topics in classical Indian thought from the perspective here advocated does not require our losing sight of the essential religious interests which motivated and informed the Indian discussions with which we are concerned; what it does require is an involvement in the history of ideas quite broadly conceived. In this context we should recall that it is now possible to treat much of classical Indian thought from a truly historical, and not merely doxographical, vantage-point. By focusing less upon belief and doctrine within single systems, and more upon the dynamic tension that arose where competing systems came into conflict, we discover that there was indeed historical progress, and that it is characterized in part by the application of methodological refinements in the areas of logic and epistemology to problems that had been defined in antiquity. This sounds very much like the history of philosophy in other settings; what must be done is to fill in the details with respect to the splendid array of questions which Indian thinkers posed and the answers about which they argued. (shrink)

The Introductory chapter explains the purpose of the book. To this aim, the chapter contains four subsections: (1)Bring the Past Into the Present, (2)Multiculturalism and Liberal Feminism: Is the Rift Between Them Necessary?, (3)Development of Gender Discourse in Chinese Culture and Thought, (4)Purpose of This Volume and Its Four Main Parts, and (5) What's Next? A Way Forward. Excerpt: "Chinese philosophy, broadly construed, in its varied roots and forms has approximately three thousand years of history, and it continues to exert (...) immense influence on the lives of Chinese people as well as on the world community. Nonetheless, if traditions are not simply to remain as antiquated ideas, they must be able to converse with contemporary readers and address their deepest concerns and longings (Pang-White, 2009b, 2009c, 2011). Premised on the undeniable facts that (1) all persons are embodied and cultural beings and that (2) traditions constitute an essential element of individual identity, it would be a mistake to attempt to eradicate traditions altogether, as certain types of liberal feminists have recommended. Instead, it would be more meaningful to ask: Can we, and how do we, re-read, re-imagine, and reconstruct canonical texts so as to find their new significance in the contemporary world? It is generally agreed that Chinese traditions have had a troubled history in dealing with gender relations—well-known examples include concubinage, foot binding,female infanticide, and so on. For various reasons, Chinese traditions and societies have generally been less enthusiastic in confronting, dialoguing about, and resolving problems of gender disparity. Even though gender studies and feminist theories have populated academic discourse in the West since the 1960s, these topics remain relatively marginalized, often as an afterthought, in Chinese philosophical and cultural discourse. Furthermore, as the growing body of research and our deepened knowledge informs and expands our conception of gender, informed persons must ask themselves how Chinese philosophical traditions would and should engage the LGBT community and their concerns. Gender studies is not and should not be perceived simply as a subject in vogue. Rather, for humanity to flourish in this incredibly interdependent network of reality, it is imperative that we have a better understanding of all members of the human community so as to relate to one another in more inclusive, caring, and just ways. Surely, many of our contemporary concerns and vocabularies are anachronistic in the historical settings of classical texts. However, even within the framework of Western traditions, phrases such as “feminism,” “gender,” and “homosexual” were not part of the existing apparatus of vocabulary until the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries (Jenainati and Groves, 2010). Moreover, with the advancement of . . . ". (shrink)

The present work introduces the neuropsychological paradigm as a new approach to studying ancient literature. In the first part of the article, an epistemological framework for the proper use of neuropsychology in relation to ancient literature is presented. The article then discusses neuropsychological methods of studying different human experiences and dimensions already addressed by ancient literatures. The experiences of human encounters with gods among ancient cultures are first considered, through the contributions of Julian Jaynes and Eric R. Dodds. The concepts (...) of right and left in the Bible, and that of soul are then discussed. Ecstatic experience in Paul of Tarsus is also presented, with a particular focus on glossolalia. Neuroscientific differences between mindful and unitive meditative practices are then described referring to ancient Buddhist literature, and finally a brief description of dreams in ancient Greek literature is proposed. Neuropsychology variously enables a more profound understanding of themes characterizing human experiences that ancient literature has already explored; these investigations prove that the collaboration of neuroscience and humanistic studies can return fruitful and interesting results. (shrink)

Recent decades have witnessed a sharp increase of interest in the cultures and regions of South and East Asia, owing in part to the prominent role Asian economies have played in the era of globalization. Asian Worldviews: Religions, Philosophies, Political Theories is a unique, reader-friendly introduction to the intellectual heritage of the region. Assuming no previous background in Asian cultural history, Asian Worldviews moves beyond chronological and geographic boundaries to present an integrated treatment of the beliefs, teachings, and ideologies that (...) have shaped the worldviews of approximately half of the global population. Rein Raud explores forms of knowledge in China, India, Tibet, Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asia, providing balanced coverage of all historical periods from antiquity to the modern day. -/- Asian Worldviews embraces the connections rather than the divisions between the religious and philosophical dimensions of South and East Asian thought, and emphasizes a robust engagement with each culture's political, social, and economic contexts. Clear, accessible chapters discuss the development of religious, philosophical, and political thought in India, China, and Japan, and provide succinct overviews of the history of ideas in Korea, Tibet, and Southeast Asia. Throughout the book, Raud uses a comparative approach to examine the mutual influence and productive dialogue, past and present, between Asian cultures as well as with the West, and considers the impact of various worldviews on the development of modern Asian societies. -/- Comprehensive and well-informed by recent developments in the scholarship, Asian Worldviews: Religions, Philosophies, Political Theories is an unparalleled resource for a broad range of courses in Asian studies, philosophy, religious studies, and global politics, as well as an excellent introduction for non-specialist readers looking for a contextual foothold in the rich cultural and intellectual history of South and East Asia. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Spiritual AuthorityA Christian PerspectiveKarl BaierOne could define spiritual authority as the power to support the opening of the entire universe —and especially of the life of human beings—toward union with the redeeming ultimate reality. Christian tradition knows several holders of this power: God, Jesus Christ, the angels, the saints and priests, spiritual guides, and last but not least each and every Christian and person of goodwill. They all are (...) spiritual authorities and together create a field of liberating power with many interdependent centers. One can conceive of spiritual authority in Christianity as a complex interplay between these various forces. The manifestation of spiritual power through them does not take place for its own sake, or to celebrate the holder of spiritual authority, but to empower other centers. Thus, spiritual power is not private property. It is only real insofar as it is passed on to others. In the field of human spiritual authority, tensions and struggles arise if the flow of authority is blocked by a particular center attempting to monopolize spiritual power for the establishment of an illusionary self-identity.Rather than going into an analysis of the entire field, I would like to take a closer look at one of its facets: “spiritual guides,” those who are acknowledged specialists in helping others to a life in the presence of God. Of course, other centers of spiritual authority will sooner or later also come into the picture, because in the field of spiritual power one authority cannot be understood without the others. Fields of other forms of power and their centers of authority (scriptural authority, political authority, etc.) also influence and partially permeate the field of spiritual authority, but that is a subject for another enquiry.Spiritual Guidance in the History of ChristianityA central socioreligious form of spiritual authority manifests itself within relationships of spiritual guidance, or (to use the common Christian phrase) within spiritual direction. The remaining part of this paper deals with concepts of spiritual direction and ways of understanding the authority of the director in his or her relationship to [End Page 107] the directee within Christian spiritual life. Before looking into the current situation, I will highlight some milestones in the history of Christian spiritual guidance.From late antiquity onward, spiritual authority was accepted within Christian communities as a specific form of authority, quite different from other forms and especially different from the authority of the clergy to lead the Church.The earliest context in which this difference appeared coincides with the beginning of spiritual direction. Spiritual direction in Christianity originated as a monastic concept.1 “Historically it was from the movement of desert monasticism that we received the idea of spiritual direction within the framework of Christian practice.”2 As abba (“father”) and amma (“mother”) ascetics, holy men or women, like the hermits of the Egyptian desert who lived on the periphery of the socioreligious zone controlled by the ecclesiastical hierarchy, functioned as independent spiritual authorities for their fellow monks and nuns as well as for people from further afield who visited the desert to ask for spiritual advice. As one can imagine, the relationship between the two forms of authority was complex, and one can observe tensions and attempts at reconciliation between the authority of the charismatic ascetics and the authority of the bishops, as well as between ascetical ideals taken from monasticism and the pastoral care for lay Christians from the fourth to the sixth century.3The Decretum Gelasianum, an official document dating back to the beginning of the sixth century, assessed that the vitae patrum—the books containing narratives of the lives and the spiritual teachings of the desert fathers—were to be accepted by the Church as valid teaching with all honor (cum omni honore suscipimus). The use of the term “father” in this text indirectly confirms that no ordination was necessary to receive this honorary title and the ministry connected to it. Most of the fathers acknowledged by the Decretum Gelasianum have never been ordained priests.When the desert tradition was superseded by organized monasticism, the charismatic authority of the abba or amma became institutionalized in the form of monastery rules, which functioned... (shrink)

There are some tantalizing suggestions that Pyrrhonian skepticism has its roots in ancient India. Of them, the most important is Diogenes Laertius’s report that Pyrrho accompanied Alexander to India, where he was deeply impressed by the character of the “naked sophists” he encountered (DL IX 61). Influenced by these gymnosophists, Pyrrho is said to have adopted the practices of suspending judgment on matters of belief and cultivating an indifferent composure amid the vicissitudes of ordinary life. Such conduct, and the attitudes (...) that it embodied, became inspirations to later skeptical thinkers. It is a fact that practices of the sort attributed to Pyrrho are richly evident in a number of ancient Indian philosophical and ascetic movements. On this basis, attempts have been made to determine the identity of these gymnosophists and, further, to pinpoint the dialectical tropes within Pyrrhonism that may have their basis in Indian thought. But despite these attempts, and in the absence of any new discoveries, these suggestions will likely remain just that. The paucity of the historical data and the problematic nature of the data itself prevent us from reconstructing a solid bridge between ancient India and Greek skepticism that may serve as the basis of robust historical theorizing. Classical India does, however, lay claim to a sophisticated and diverse culture of epistemological reflection, which includes a number of innovative skeptical thinkers deserving study on their own merits. This chapter is meant to provide such a study, or perhaps more accurately, a prolegomena for such. After some initial ground-laying, I will discuss three leading Indian skeptics and situate them historically and conceptually within the network of competing schools that comprise classical Indian philosophy. They are Nāgārjuna (c. 150 CE), the founder of Madhyamaka Buddhism, Jayarāśi (c. 800), associated with the Indian materialist tradition, and Śrīharṣa (c. 1150), a thinker connected to the school of Nondual (Advaita) Vedānta. (shrink)